Tuesday, December 1, 2009

New Contract for America? Or same old crap again?

The Republican leadership has come up with a new Contract for America that continues to offer a counterpoint of big government to the Democrats' version of big government. Here are the ten points of the Contract for America drawn up by Dick Army:

BE IT RESOLVED, that the Republican National Committee identifies ten (10) key public policy positions for the 2010 election cycle, which the Republican National Committee expects its public officials and candidates to support:
(1) We support smaller government, smaller national debt, lower deficits and lower taxes by opposing bills like Obama’s “stimulus” bill;
(2) We support market-based health care reform and oppose Obama-style government run health care;
(3) We support market-based energy reforms by opposing cap and trade legislation;
(4) We support workers’ right to secret ballot by opposing card check;
(5) We support legal immigration and assimilation into American society by opposing amnesty for illegal immigrants;
(6) We support victory in Iraq and Afghanistan by supporting military-recommended troop surges;
(7) We support containment of Iran and North Korea, particularly effective action to eliminate their nuclear weapons threat;
(8) We support retention of the Defense of Marriage Act;
(9) We support protecting the lives of vulnerable persons by opposing health care rationing and denial of health care and government funding of abortion; and
(10) We support the right to keep and bear arms by opposing government restrictions on gun ownership.
RESOLVED, that a candidate who disagrees with three or more of the above stated public policy positions of the Republican National Committee, as identified by the voting record, public statements and/or signed questionnaire of the candidate, shall not be eligible for financial support and endorsement by the Republican National Committee.


By including numbers 6 and 7 the Republicans have flatly stated that they will not reduce DoD or intelligence expenditures. The only way that thay can continue to fund two wars and massive presence around the globe is to deal with the Democrats in Congress. That means that the Republicans will not be able to cut any social spending programs and therefore their number 1 point is absolutely impossible.
The rest of the points do not greatly impact the budget and are there mostly to attempt to differentiate mainstream Republicans from Democrats. Some of the points are important, but do not address the existential problem of an out-of-control Federal behemoth. This list of points will result in more unpayable debt and more government, not less.

Now I saw a list on digg.com to replace the list that the Military Industrial Complex wrote for Dick Armey. Here it is:

1. Balanced Budget
2. Tort Reform
3. Repeal the 17th Amendment
4. Term limits
5. End the War on Drugs
6. End all funding of other nations
7. Exit strategy for all miltary involvement overseas
8. Abolish the IRS/Tax code and institute a progressive flat tax for everyone living above poverty level. No exemptions!
9. All congressional salary, benefits require 2/3 vote from public.
10. Any civillian conviction requires dismissal of the Congressman or Senator from Congress


That got me thinking....
I haven't had time to write a list yet, but I might change a couple of Mr. h8f8kes points. In the meantime, what do you think?

1 comment:

kent4jmj said...

That list is a darn good start.